Newsweek Caught Stealth Editing 2015 Article to Smear Tom Cotton on “Ranger” Issue
We’re getting into scary territory if the media will just edit or erase anything that contradicts the truth of a Republican’s past or make Democrats look bad.
National Review covered Salon’s hit piece on Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AK), which tried to accuse him of lying about his military record.
But there’s a small part in the National Review article that should drive everyone mad.
At Salon, Roger Sollenberger claimed that completing Ranger School does not make one an actual Ranger. He also insisted that the military agrees with him. I emphasized the important part:
In his first run for Congress, Cotton leaned heavily on his military service, claiming to have been “a U.S. Army Ranger in Iraq and Afghanistan,” and, in a campaign ad, to have “volunteered to be an Army Ranger.” In reality, Cotton was never part of the 75th Ranger Regiment, the elite unit that plans and conducts joint special military operations as part of the U.S. Army Special Operations Command.
Rather, Cotton attended the Ranger School, a two-month-long, small-unit tactical infantry course that literally anyone in the military is eligible to attend. Soldiers who complete the course earn the right to wear the Ranger tab — a small arch that reads “Ranger” — but in the eyes of the military, that does not make them an actual Army Ranger.
Newsweek jumped on Salon’s back with its own article about Rep. Jason Crow (D-CO) telling Cotton that he wasn’t a Ranger if he didn’t wear the 75th Ranger Regiment beret.
Someone better put Crow in touch with retired Command Sergeant Major Rick Merritt because he said he knew of plenty of Rangers who served in other regiments.